PAINTED BRAIN @SAITO

Speaking Out About Schizophrenia, Bipolar Disorder, and Mental Illness

What is Painted Brain Speakers Bureau?

By speaking in raw and honest terms about living with psychiatric symptoms in a complex world, we challenge students of all ages, backgrounds, and persuasions to think differently about mental illness. Our speakers represent all walks of life and all types of mental health experiences. We do not script a message for audiences though will tailor the talk towards the demographic. For example, in speaking to young mental health professionals the focus will be on how our speakers have experienced mental health workers, whereas speaking to high school students the focus is on that period of our speakers lives. Speakers are welcome to talk from a variety of viewpoints, open or not about specific diagnoses, personally choosing to be on medication and choosing not to be. Though often prosaic, we are never proscriptive. We start the conversation, and all talks are half story telling and half dialogue with audience members. We will change your views on schizophrenia. Bring us in for your team or students.

Who is Painted Brain’s Speakers Bureau?

Our speakers bureau presents a mix of voices from professionals and peer leaders. Painted Brain feels that mental health providers, like our director, can benefit the field of mental health by opening up about our own struggles. Professionals do nothing for stigma reduction by hiding our own mental health challenges, and such secrecy perpetuates the false dichotomy between mental illness and mental health. Our speakers are artists of all stripes, loud advocates for a new view of psychiatric symptoms and brave voices charting a path towards an identity that incorporates mental health instead of denying the importance of this aspect in our development.

Why is there a Painted Brain Speakers Bureau?

Direct contact is the best and only way to help change people’s attitudes about each other. Our speakers bureau has the most dramatic, immediate impact on audiences of any Painted Brain activity. Our talks consistently, and with statistical significance, led audience members to reconsider their ideas about people with mental illness in three key areas: reduced stigmatizing attitudes, improved attitudes about ability and potential, and increased belief in the potential for recovery. More crucially, audience members reported an increased likelihood of seeking mental health treatment and support for themselves if needed.

Where does Speakers Bureau Speak?

Teenline Operators Training

New Roads High School

USC School of Social Work

UCLA School of Social Work

Pepperdine Masters of Family Therapy Program

Antioch Masters of Family Therapy Program

USC School of Occupational Therapy

South Bay Youth Center

Los Angeles Conservation Corps - Saito High School and Pico High School

UCLA Active Minds Student Organization

UCLA’s Committee on Disabilities

LA City Public Defender's Office

Speakers Bureau at SAITO high school

How does the Speakers Bureau work?

Research and experience tells us that stigma is best overcome through personal contact. We provide this through our speaker’s bureau, in which Painted Brain artists present to audiences about their own lived experiences with life, love, growth and recovery. We target our talks for specific audiences. For example, with high school students, our speakers focus on what they wish they had known about mental illness before they developed symptoms themselves. For students of Social Work and Occupational Therapy, the focus is on what has and has not been helpful in interacting with professionals. We always save significant time for questions and discussion with the audience.

How do we know the Speakers Bureau has an impact?

After rapidly growing in scope to include presentations to high school and college students as well as grad students, we were approached by a representative of the National Consortium of Stigma and Empowerment to conduct an assessment of the impact of our brand of speakers bureau on student audiences. The Consortium was run under the auspices of University of Chicago by the renowned Stigma researcher Patrick Corrigan, PsyD. Painted Brain had the honor of being included in the Consortium’s impact study. To do so, we administers a pre- and post-assessment to our audience members. The assessment was designed and then analyzed by the Consortium back in Chicago. Data was gathered without identifying information of the participants. In addition, a cohort from the Consortium observed one of our presentations to UCLA college students involved in Active Minds.

History of Painted Brain Speakers Bureau

Painted Brain Speakers Bureau began in 2009 after our director got a request from a professor of Social Work at USC reached out to invite artists from the Painted Brain to talk to a class of graduate students about living with mental illness and how art is a part of recovery. Not only was the experience fun and moving to all, it felt like a natural extension of our intentions to change the discussion about mental illness.

Allison Peters one of our team members shared why she created where is my mind: ⚠️ Warning ⚠️ TRIGGER WARNING ⚠️

My first ever free mental heal show is happening Sunday May26. This is my heart. This is my sole. Growing up every up and down in my life the words coming out the speakers would pull away from suicidal thoughts. Before I started working with a mental health organization saying that out loud scared me. I want people to come to my show and not only enjoy music but to hear how others cope and love with their own mental health issues. No matter how you cope you will be met with support and love. I am so happy that we are not only taking about mental health but something vary close to it addiction.

Doors open at 5pm and some how I managed to pull a musician whose music pull me away form my suitcase thoughts regularly
❤️❤️👍👍👍🎧💊❤️❤️